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Decoding the chemistry that informs the choices a woman makes behind her closet door—fueled at once by practical and emotional impulses—isn’t an easy science. Few designers understand that better than Sacai’s Chitose Abe, and the collection she showed today was yet another stellar example. The Tokyoite cut her teeth as a pattern-maker for Comme des Garçons, later launching her own label with knits, and has been expanding her repertoire at an exponential rate: She was one of the first to examine the three-dimensional aspects of fashion, and her signature hybrid looks are known to leave lasting and entirely contrasting impressions on entering and exiting a room. This largely comes down to her knack for pulling apart the most archetypal items in our wardrobe, then reconfiguring them in a way that is awe-inspiring and unexpected, without ever being overwrought.

For fall, Abe started by looking at the trench from all angles, and opened with a dress that was paneled with velvet in the front, then cut with the coat’s familiar moving parts—fold-over cuffs, a high collar, and a billowing single pleat back: After adjusting your eye, what emerged was in essence a modern rendition of the LBD. To add to that rich texture, men’s suiting fabrics and the traditional sports coat was cleverly turned inside-out, fused with the casual cool of a bomber jacket and finished with an undulating peplum. The playful flutter of lingerie is never too far away at Sacai, and lace panels were often peeking out from between the pleats of a skirt, or collaged into the backs of sweaters. Combining the feminine and the masculine in the space of one coat is something Abe does with such a skilled hand that even her most intricate wintery remixes looked easy and light.

Backstage after the show, the designer talked of a fascination with bringing seemingly incongruous elements together. “But ultimately, the concept is confined to my thought processes,” she said. “The point is to make clothes that feel wearable.” As editors and buyers lined up to congratulate her, each one seemed to be making a mental note of the outwear they hope to buy next fall. “I want it all,” whispered one editor, inadvertently thinking aloud. Reactions like these are the product of a rare and desirous alchemy indeed.